West Midlands (region)
The West Midlands is a geographical term describing the western half of central England, known as the Midlands.
There is some ambiguity in the use of the name as between 1974 and 1986 it was used for the metropolitan county of West Midlands, and is still used by various organisations within that area such as West Midlands Police and West Midlands Fire Service.
The West Midlands Region is sometimes considered to spread as far as Cheshire, Gloucestershire and Oxfordshire, but the core area consists of the traditional counties of:
This same core area is now the official governmental West Midlands Region. It is divided into the following administrative counties:
